2022.05.17 – 06.11
Opening hour: 12.00-18.00
Closed on Sun, Mon, National holiday

We are pleased to announce the 2 artists show of Yoshinori NIWA (b.1982) based in Vienna, and Naoya HIRATA (b.1991).

Many of Niwa Yoshinori’s works take the form of social interventions spanning diverse media, including performance, film, installations, and projects that progress during the exhibition. The clearly stated titles of works are slogan-like and self-explanatory, and in most cases, the entire process of carrying out unproductive and meaningless actions in public spaces is documented on film. By exposing various disturbances generated in the course of putting the work’s title into practice, the artist has revealed the boundaries and limitations of the “public” concept in numerous projects in Japan and abroad. In 2016 Niwa moved his base of operations to the Austrian capital of Vienna, and has been focusing on the social functions of visual media.

Dealing with the themes of space, time, and physicality, Naoya Hirata employs preexisting 3D models and images, which he has collected from the Internet, and using an assemblage method, he presents actual projections of sculptural works that were constructed in virtual computer spaces. By manifesting other realities, which are part of a new order, through virtual images, Hirata examines the relationship between real things by creating different versions of a plausible world while at the time offering contemporary interpretations of sculpture history.

Hirata quickly moves back and forth between the real and the virtual, enabling us to enjoy the myriad qualities of each state. The projected works are marked by disparate features: some are photographs, others are three-dimensional sculptures made with a 3D printer, and still others are images. These sculptural works, which dwell in a virtual space, are projected in the real world.

Satoko Oe Contemporary

2022.2.26 – 3.26
Opening hour: 12.00-18.00
Closed on Sun, Mon, National holiday

Satoko Oe Contemporary

2021.9.25 – 10.23
Opening hour:12.00-18.00
Closed on Sun, Mon, National holiday


Dealing with the themes of space, time, and physicality, Naoya Hirata employs preexisting 3D models and images, which he has collected from the Internet, and using an assemblage
method, he presents actual projections of sculptural works that were constructed in virtual computer
spaces. By manifesting other realities, which are part of a new order, through virtual images, Hirata
examines the relationship between real things by creating different versions of a plausible world while
at the time offering contemporary interpretations of sculpture history.

Hirata quickly moves back and forth between the real and the virtual, enabling us to enjoy the myriad
qualities of each state. The projected works are marked by disparate features: some are photographs,
others are three-dimensional sculptures made with a 3D printer, and still others are images.
These sculptural works, which dwell in a virtual space, are projected in the real world.

The title of the exhibition, Against Nature, is derived from an eponymous 1884 novel by the French
writer Joris-Karl Huysmans that was translated into Japanese by Shibusawa Tatsuhiko.
The story centers on Jean Des Esseintes, the descendent of a noble family, who shuts himself away
in a house in the suburbs, and while living a secret life, creates an artificial paradise inside his room.

We hope that you will take this opportunity to catch a glimpse of this artificial paradise created by Hirata.

Satoko Oe Contemporary

24 July – 7 August, 2021
24 August – 4 September, 2021
Opening hour: 12.00-18.00
Summer holiday: 8 – 23 August
Closed on Sunday, Monday, and National holiday
No opening reception will be held.


We are pleased to announce the summer show showing the fictional documentary film work “The Communities We Must Have Imagined” included in the solo show of Yoshinori NIWA in 2019, and the works by IKEZAKI Takuya, Kesang LAMDARK, Naoya HIRATA, Shigeru HASEGAWA, and Makiko MASUTANI. We look forward to welcoming you soon.

Satoko Oe Contemporary

2021.06.01 – 07.03
Opening hour: 12.00-18.00
Closed on Sun, Mon, National holiday

When you hear the title The Sower, are you reminded of Millet’s painting of that name, or one of the many Van Gogh works that share the same title? Or do you think of a picture by a different artist? Although you might not have actually seen the painting, The Sower is a very well-known title.

When asked why he chose The Sower, a subject addressed by many artists, as the title of this exhibition, Shigeru Hasegawa replied, “I just wanted to quote a painting that everybody knew very well.” It might well have been something else, like Sunflowers or The Scream, but since Hasegawa lived in Holland for a long time and painted lots of flowers and fruits, he thought The Sower was not totally unrelated.

“It’s not as if I want to express a certain thing with my paintings, or that there was a beautiful landscape or diva that I wanted to paint. I just want to paint pictures. To make my pictures, I have long taken an experimental approach in which I extract, dismantle, and reassemble motifs used in masterpieces from every age and region that I remembered being emotionally affected by, and then apply my own method of painting. For example, if I wanted to paint vegetables, I create a link to Arcimboldo or Jakuchu. If I wanted to paint curtains, I could do the same with Dutch interior paintings, or if wanted to paint a chair, I could create a link to Van Gogh. Except when I paint these things, a fish is not a fish, and an apple is not an apple. If might sound like some kind of Zen koan, but everything is just there because I wanted to paint a picture.”

As the novel coronavirus began to rage, and the world fell silent and became shrouded in despair, I imagined that like a sower, every artist was moving their brush while imagining a day when people might have a chance to see the pictures they were making. The pleasure of imagining the movement of a brush, listening closely to a sound, and coming face to face with a painting is akin to the Barbizon painters’ attempts to convey the “pleasures of life” by depicting the everyday activities of farmers. In the present age, however, this is an “ordinary miracle.” For me, it is important to remember that the pleasure of running a gallery is to enable as many people as possible to experience this kind of ordinary miracle.

2020.2.24 – 03.20
opening hour : 12.00-18.00
closed on 4th, and 5th Mar.
Closed on Sun, Mon, National holiday


We are pleased to announce the 3 artists show of Shigeru HASEGAWA (b.1963), imaginary Argentine artist, Luca COSTA (b.1989) and newly introducing virtual sculptor, Naoya HIRATA (b.1991).

Shigeru HASEGAWA shows his 3m dog painting painted in 1997. Luca COSTA will make an installation combining the new and previous works. Naoya HIRATA will show his virtual sculptures meant to be shown at Art Collaboration Kyoto. We look forward to welcoming you.

Satoko Oe Contemporary

31 October – 28 November, 2020
Opening hours: 12.00-19.00
Closed on Sun, Mon, and National Holiday

We are pleased to announce the solo show of Mitsuhiro IKEDA ” dawn ” at the above period.

The work of Mitsuhiro Ikeda (b.1978) involves carefully planning out complex and inexplicable perceptual architectures and experiences and painting them in numerous layers. Each landscape is not simply a record of a place, but structurally resembles a novel imbued with the memory of a place, a tale spun through the intricate intertwining of motifs, paint, and subject matter. Scattered fragments of paint converge, fragmentarily remembered scenes are selected, and the painting completed as if skimming the top layer of a concoction. While foreseeing the ways in which things develop, he sometimes pauses to observe phenomena, at other times is swept along by the unrestrained dynamism of the paint, eventually seeking out and guiding the work to its conclusion. Each ending leads to a new beginning, with a fresh canvas and a new tale to tell. He maintains faith that endlessly repeated acts will accumulate to give the works their richness.

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Light shines in, and images of objects and phenomena vaguely emerge. The outlines of shapes appear gradually, like mere premonitions, then melt into slumber again. In the outlines that coalesce and dissolve again and again, images take shape. Storytelling, imagining, thought, and more––are all processes that begin in this state between sleep and awakening. Rather than immediately rendering the contours of things clearly, I let my gaze linger on an undifferentiated mass of things, separating them out one by one and weaving them together in slumber. This process is not one of assigning or capturing definite shapes of things, but of distributing possible states of being throughout spaces.
Mitsuhiro IKEDA
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The exhibition title dawn refers to the time when the sky grows light, but also has other meanings including “beginning” and “premonition.” At a time when the way forward is so uncertain, we will be delighted if this exhibition heralds new beginnings, like the creation stories of mythology, and sheds new light on the future. The gallery plans to present four to six new works, with a new work entitled dawn (like the exhibition as a whole) as a centerpiece. We look forward to welcoming you at the exhibition.

5 September – 3 October, 2020
Opening hours: 12.00-19.00
Closed on Sun, Mon, and National Holiday

We are pleased to announce the solo show of Shinichiro KANO “logs” at the above period.
Interview with Shinichiro KANO

13 Jun – 11 Jul, 2020
Opening hours: 12.00-19.00
Closed on Sun, Mon, and National Holiday
We are pleased to announce the postponed group show “Evacuation” at the above period.

“Evacuation” is the group show with the works of all the artists we work with.
We aim to exist as an evacuation shelter in the society, and glad to welcome you again at our space.

28 Mar – 12 Apr, 2020
We will have a joint party from 19.00 on 28 Mar, at Sunday, Mishuku.
Opening hours: 12.00-19.00
Closed on Sun, Mon, and National Holiday
We are open till 18.00 on the first day of 28th Mar.
We will open on 12 Apr, Sun （12.00-19.00）

We are pleased to announce the participation of “Onsen Confidential”

“Onsen Confidential” hosts the oversea galleries and exhibits the works at the host galleries in Tokyo.
We will host Arcadia Missa (London, UK), Good Weather (North Little Rock, USA), Federico Vavassori (Milan, Italy).

We look forward to welcoming you soon!

For more information → Onsen Confidential